PLANNING has already begun for a major Manx National Heritage exhibition to mark the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the First World War.
The exhibition will open at the Manx Museum in January 2014 and will run throughout the anniversary year.
Curators would therefore like to hear from anyone who has material which they feel they can contribute.
The First World War was the world’s first truly global conflict.
The war affected the lives of those at every level of society in the Isle of Man, from Government House down to those in the humblest croft, as sons were sent to the trenches, daughters went to work in munitions factories or volunteered as nurses, fathers helped guard the island from attack and mothers raised money for Belgian refugees and knitted socks for those at the Front.
Manx National Heritage curator of social history Matthew Richardson said: ‘This exhibition will look at the whole range of Manx experiences in the First World War, from soldiers on the battlefields, to sailors at sea, women in factories, conscientious objectors, politicians, fishermen and others on the Home Front.
‘If you have family letters, diaries, photographs or artefacts relating to a Manx person who lived through the First World War, we would be delighted to hear from you. We are particularly keen to find material relating to the less well documented aspects of the war, such as its impact on women.’
In many ways the war created the modern world in which we live today, introducing for the first time state control of industry, daylight saving and the gradual decline of a sense of deference on the part of the working classes towards those in authority.
The First World War also changed the face of warfare forever.
The conflict began with the horse as the prime mover on the battlefield, and with cavalry making heroic charges in the battles of 1914. However, the machine gun soon came to dominate the battlefield and it quickly saw the horse being superseded by the tank and the aeroplane.
At sea, the first ever attack made on an enemy ship by a plane carrying a torpedo was launched in 1915 from the Isle of Man’s own Ben-my-Chree. It would render most of the world’s navies (including the mighty Dreadnought battleships) obsolete overnight, as the age of the aircraft carrier was born.
Under the waves, a new deadly threat emerged – the submarine.
While the Isle of Man housed thousands of enemy aliens in internment camps, many of its men were fighting on battlefronts across the world, while its women were engaged in a range of war-related work.
Talking about the scale of planning such an exhibition, Mr Richardson said: ‘Major exhibitions always take a lot of planning, and an exhibition on this scale is certainly no exception to that rule.
‘That is why we would like to hear now from anyone who has letters, photographs or artefacts which they feel may be relevant to this subject.
‘Even if you feel able to loan material to us for just a short time, this would still be useful and would enable us to photograph, record or copy these items.’
For more information contact Matthew Richardson by calling 648053 or by email {mailto:matthew.richardson@gov.im|matthew.richardson(at)gov.im}.